A time of solitary reflection meets with recollection.
An opaque future can lead to an illuminated past. I want to go beyond my
substantial collection of regrets, because I have the gift of regretting almost
everything I’ve done from the age of three. Being in the wrong place at the
wrong time; being the wrong person; saying the wrong thing. Everlasting
responsibility.
Some things from the past, though, may be for present comfort. I dig them out. Who was I, before all this happened? I find my paper dolls, so pretty and talented. (And hand-coloured, my earliest artistic effects). My comics, buried at the bottom of the cupboard: I read them again. My books: The Princess and the Goblin, with her marvellous ancient grandmother (a good reason not to fear old age); Alice, who always asks the next logical question (“Who in the world am I?”); the Tailor of Gloucester, with No More Twist. Peanut butter cookies, chocolate pudding, and my cousins’ cardamom bread. Skipping rope; trying to fly (broken arm: don’t try this again). There’s a world there, with you still in it. The Kingdom of God is like a little child. What do you still have at home?
